INT: What's the relationship that you have with your Technical Director [TD]? Is there anything specific? Anything you acquire? Anything the Director needs to know? How do you deal with the TD?
JR: The TD, I always asked, be ready to punch the button, but don't anticipate. For example, I would mark a script and say, on a particular line, we might be going to camera three. And I would hold up my hand and just because the line is read, I would say, "Just a minute. Hold it, hold it, hold it. Now." And snap. And the TDs were trained -- at least, the ones that I liked -- to wait for that snap. I said, "Don't, don’t think just because the camera's coming up next that you've heard a cue. Let it come from me." I will be there. There are times, sometimes I'll ad lib. Like, I remember in ALL IN THE FAMILY -- one of the great things about ALL IN THE FAMILY, live, I was looking at a shot that was not planned that happened to be on Carroll O'Connor's face, and he was reacting to something not planned. And I said, "Take three!" You know, very quick; and he was alert enough to get with me. And I got a huge laugh on some scowl or some reaction cut. And I had to tell the Actors later, I said, "You know, remember that line about so and so?” I said, “The reason the laugh came that you're not expecting is that Carroll did something and I got it. So I'll do it again.” I said, “Be prepared this time." But frequently, that's somebody your better moments.

INT: Now you're watching how many screens?
JR: Four. [INT: You’re watching four screens?] Yeah. [INT: So four cameras in motion?] Oh yeah, I meant to tell you about the four camera system. When I was first offered the job and I asked Norman [Lear] where we're gonna shoot and he said CBS Television City, I said, "Well, wait a minute. They don't shoot film there." And he said, "That's right." I said, "Well how are you gonna do this?" It's 1970. He said, "It's on tape." I said, "Tape?” I said, “You can't edit tape." He said, "No, it's live. Live on tape." I said, "You mean top to bottom?" He said, "Well, we'll do two shows." I said, "Wait a minute. I haven't been in a live control room” -- at that point for about 18, 20 years." I said, "You want me to cut this show live?" "Yeah," he said. "We have no budget, but that's the only thing they accepted." I said, “It can’t be done.” And it was three camera. The whole world was three camera film. And so they would get me three video cameras. I said, "You can't do it with three cameras." "What do you mean?" I said, "If you want it live, and I will, I will work tight – ‘know as opposed to some of the people of that period always worked in waist shots and partly it's because the camera operators were afraid to get in too tight, they're afraid to get caught. And I said, "You need close-ups with a family thing like this. I want to get close for reactions." And in order to cut properly, where I can't edit, I'll need a fourth camera. Well, CBS [Columbia Broadcasting System] went almost ballistic. They said, "Money!" I said, "I can't do it otherwise." And I really meant that. There was no way I could properly cover it. So they reluctantly, they gave me the fourth camera. Now, that became the standard because out of ALL IN THE FAMILY came THE JEFFERSONS and MAUDE, and ONE DAY AT A TIME and SANFORD AND SON, and that became the issue. People shot four camera tape.

INT: And what were you using before? You had one wider shot, two would be at angles--
JR: No, no. I would use--I would be-- [INT: Mixed around?] Mixed around. I wouldn't just stay on one wide shot. I would frequently just go in on--I'd have three or four close-ups sometimes. It was daring. The operators were always a little nervous and I would say, "Just don't worry. Get in. Work on longer lenses.” That was another thing. I detested those wide angle lenses. I used to call it selling a 1958 Plymouth 'cause you would extend the flippers. I'd say, "No, no. Get on a different element.” I said, “I want something that, that gets closer to the human eye. Like a 50 millimeter." Anyway, the reason for mentioning the fourth camera is that after I had finished ALL IN THE FAMILY, I was now freelancing again for awhile in TV film. We're back to a film set, and I walked on the set, and I said, "Hey. There are four cameras here." And they said, "Yeah." And I said, "Well, what's the purpose of the fourth film camera?" They said, "Everybody uses four cameras." I said, "No they don't. You only need three in film. You can edit." "I don't know what you're talking about." "It's always been four film cameras now!" [INT: Great, great.]

INT: Now there was no editing at all, so you either ran one show or the other? [JR: Yeah.] Or you couldn’t, you couldn't – no splicing?
JR: Could not end the cut initially. It drove me crazy because I remember-- [INT: You’d have something good here, something good there.] Exactly right. And I was in the bowels of CBS [Columbia Broadcasting System] one day with two inch tape with a man who had been assigned as the cutter, only he was not a cutter, editor -- But he couldn't edit. [INT: Electrician.] Yeah, he was an electrician, you know? So I saw something and I said, "Hold it! Stop right there." And he stopped and I said, "The picture disappeared." He said, "Yeah, you said stop." And I had known, roughly, that you couldn't edit, but here I was faced with the reality of a far better performance of the afternoon show. I said, "You mean, I can't get to that piece of film or tape?" He said, “No. "Well you could edit." I said, "How?" He said, "Well, it takes about seven or eight hours for each edit." I said, "What are you talking about?" And the method was, you could make a rough edit if you--I can't believe. [INT: What? What?] Well, they had a can of silver nitrate solution-- [INT: Right--] which they would paint over the tape and that would, looking through a microscope, would reveal the striations. I hope--it made no sense to me--I hope I'm making sense to whoever's watching this. [INT: Right, right, right, right, right.] But there was some kind of electronic jiggles and if you lined them up precisely-- [INT: You could pop it.] You could make an edit. It was like cutting a diamond. [INT: Got it.] Because you're cutting negative-- And there's no recovery. Once it's gone, it's gone. And so I said, in my stupidity, I said, "Let me try one of those." "Do you mean it?" I said, “Yeah.” So we made it and it took about four hours. I said, "Well you can't do this regularly." And after the first thirteen weeks, I was a wreck. And I said, "I can't do this anymore." And I went to Hawaii for a holiday with my family. And there, two things happened that were really important -- groundbreaking. I was on the island of Kauaʻi [aka the ‘Garden Isle’]. It was a Sunday. The show had been canceled. People don't realize that ALL IN THE FAMILY was canceled into the first thirteen weeks, but it had been granted a re-run that summer, and I figured, “Why not? I'm not coming back to this thing.” But something happened in the re-runs and it caught fire, and okay. So I'm on the island of Kaua’i and a Japanese waitress said to us, "Do you mind if I collect for the lunch now? I've got to go home, there's something important I've got--" And I was joking with her, "What's so important on a sunny day, on a Sunday in Kaua’i?" She said, "There's a new show on called ALL IN THE FAMILY and I've got to see it." Now it's a Sunday so it's obviously on a delay and I didn't tip to her what I did. I said, "Why, why do you want to watch this show?" And this Japanese woman said, "That Archie Bunker. That's my husband." And I said to my wife, "Hey, if this woman has made that translation, there's something going on here." And of course it was. I didn't realize how profound it was, but the re-runs, everybody had an Archie Bunker in the family: my uncle, my cousin, my father. My father was kind of a Bunker, unfortunately. Norman Lear's father, certainly. He used to actually literally say stifle. [INT: Wow.] Anyway, the other thing that was profound was that I ran into Bob Sweeney, wonderful Actor that I worked with on OUR MISS BROOKS was now a Director. And he was directing HAWAII 5-0. One of my favorite shows. And he said ALL IN THE FAMILY was one of his favorite shows. So we exchanged compliments. And I said, "But I'm not going back.” I said, “Even if it's renewed and I hear rumbles that it might be coming back." He said, "Why don't you want to come back?" I said, "I can't edit the damn thing. It's driving me crazy." He said, "Do you know a man named Hal Collins." I said, “I’ve never heard of him.” Have you ever heard that name? [INT: uh-uh.] Hal Collins was a gag Writer for Milton Berle. He was also a guy who kind of played around with electronic tape in his apartment. He said, "Look him up and he'll show you what he's got." I said, “Well, okay.” Hal Collins had a small apartment over a garage behind the Pink Pussycat on Santa Monica Boulevard. Hal was a wonderful man. He's left us, unfortunately. But he was very obese. And his bulk practically filed his little apartment along with all his electronic gear. I don't know, he collected this stuff. [INT: Right.] And what he showed me was a helical scan, black and white, video tape recorder. I didn't even know what those words meant. It looked like a regular audio tape, reel to reel. And I said, "Well, what's so special about it?" So he said, "Well, I'll play it." And he played it. And he stopped and the picture remained on the screen. And I said, "Wait a minute. Can you put time code on this?" He said, "Sure." I said, "It's a moviola." It's a crude, but effective--it turned out--moviola. Well from then on--I did sign up again as we know-- and then I would edit all of the stuff in Hal Collins' garage. [INT: Wow.] All of ALL IN THE FAMILY was edited there. And what happened was, he would play the thing--we would re-record on his black and white [television]-- [INT: Right.] Very grainy. [INT: Yeah, yeah.] The picture didn't matter. And if I would get to a point in the afternoon show and said, "That's better," we could make an edit by making a notation as to the time code. And it was very complex because he had an adding machine that rolled over at--I guess it was 99 cents like a regular adding machine--and we had to do calculations every time we made an edit because it was a 30 second-- [INT: Right.] --timeframe and whether it was--what was the word? It was drop code or non-drop code. [INT: Drop code. Yeah, that’s right. It was drop or non-drop.] There was a frame that was lost or gained on one or the other. You had to be a mathematician. And I kept--I was always impatient and I said, "Hal, this is nonsense that we have to do this. Can't we get a little machine that does this?” So we went to the Victor adding machine company and they made a machine for us that rolled over at thirty frames. We went to the next second by thirties. [INT: Right.] I mean, it was not a big deal, but it was a breakthrough. [INT: Yup.] And then I said, "You know, I'm looking at this--" by the way, I used to do this at midnight, one in the morning, two in the morning. [INT: Phew--] It was incredible. And then it would be translated by Bob LaHendro into the two inch machines. The time code could talk to the machine somehow. I don’t-- Don't ask me how. [INT: But it did.] But it talked. And you were able to, by putting up a third tape, you could make switches and create an edited master. You had to be very careful about timing because once you got it onto that-- [INT: Two-incher?] that collected reel, you couldn't go back. [INT: Right.] So you had to edit in your head or on paper as you went along, to make sure you're coming out at 29 [Frames].

INT: Now how many edits would you be making?
JR: Oh my god. Once they got going, I would do pull-ups. You know, people don't realize that as good as that cast was, nobody could talk that fast. So I used to pull-up, pull-up, pull-up, take out any kind of breath. [INT: So you actually would make maybe fifty a hundred edits in this process?] Oh, easily. [INT: Wow!] Easily. [INT: This is way before you could -- ] Way before you could do it well. [INT: And you got to do it this primitive—and you we're the only guys who were doing it, right?] Yeah. Yeah, we were. And CBS [Columbia Broadcasting System] came up with a machine that they wanted us to use. They were horrified that we were farming out this editing and I said, “The machine--” By that time, I was making internal edits. I said, "The machine can't do that." And they couldn't. Hal Collins edited, for us, all of the Norman Lear product. [INT: Phew.] All of it.

INT: Now when you say edited, here's the interesting question. We're talking about editing. He did the physical.
JR: He did the physical, I did the editing. I actually said, "Here, right here." [INT: Right.] But he did MAUDE, JEFFERSONS, all of those things, you know? GOOD TIMES. And in fact, it was farmed out. The rest of the world was doing-- During the world of electronic editing, it all went through Hal Collins. We paid him $500 an episode and all he could eat. [INT: Right.] I mean, he was a big, heavy man. [INT: Yeah, I got it. I got it.] But he loved--and he loved the company. He was a loner. Very interesting man. And he just loved doing this. [INT: That’s fabulous.] Anyway. [INT: Now what's the difference--] But let me get to what really made it work better. When I would take it down at first, before I had Lehendro do it, I would go into the bowels of CBS [Columbia Broadcasting System] with the two inch tape and watch the assembly; and I had this guy who had been the quote editor who was always grumbling that we weren’t-- He didn't like doing all the work. He had too much-- [makes busy hand gestures]. There was a guy who was sweeping up all the time who always looked like he was interested. He was looking over shoulder. And one day I took him aside and I said, "I know you sweep up a lot, but what do you do?" He said, "I'm a maintenance engineer." I said, "You know how these machines work?" He said, "Yeah." I said, "How'd you like to become an editor?" He said, "Oh my god.” He said, “It's two, two jumps in pay scale.” He said, “They'll never go for it." I said, "Do you know anything about editing?" He said, “No.” I said, "But you know the machine." "Yeah." I said, "You're my editor." And I went to CBS and I said, "I want this guy jumped." Whoa. They went crazy. I said, "No, I can teach him." It's Marco Zappia. Now Marco Zappia is the dean of all video editors today. [INT: Right.] Brilliant. He's just a lovely man and he was fearless in that, when I would ask for something, he would get it done. And I don't know how he did it, but he knew the electronics. And one day, we were talking about--having gotten to be able to edit between the so-called dress show and the air show, and we'd go back and forth sometimes. Sometimes, there was a reading that had to be split. And I said, "I want to get in between those words." He said, "Oh, you can't do that." I said, "Why?" And he described something. Something about, well, apparently, as the tape is moving, there's a video head here, there's an audio head here, and it's about eleven feet-- [INT: Frames?] or inches or something behind. [INT: Right, right.] He said, "If you want to cut any of the audio, you cut it here, you're gonna destroy the video. If you cut it here, you're gonna destroy the audio. You can't do it." So I was grousing about it. I wanted the perfect answer and I said, "If it's there, it can be gotten somehow." And I said, "Isn't there some way you could blind the head for a moment?" Now, I don't know anything about engineering. So I don't even know if the term was correct. But I said, "If you can make the thing not know that it's being edited, can't you do it? First blind the video head and cut the audio, then go back and blind the audio and cut the video?" He said, "My god. Yeah." So I came back the next time we edited, he said, "I've got a solution." And what he had found was, he said if you take a CBS shipping label and you fold it exactly eight times, you put it over the head and the tape runs over the label and you blind it [mimes process] and you blind. I said, “Oh.” And it became the state of the art of internal editing in 1972. [INT: Wow.] And Marco would do this, this trick. And as I say, sometimes I would be down there at two or three in the morning and I'm fussing with it. And I said, "Marco, I know we could do this." I’d say, "God damn it.” I said, “Can't you make a machine? You guys are engineers! Can't a machine do what that stupid tape is doing? Which takes a half hour to fold? And you've gotta be--it's so precious?" I said, "Get a machine!" So he said, "Well, I don't know." I said, "Think about it." About a month later, I came down there and about six engineers were standing around a machine, smiling. "What? What’s this?" They got my button. So you had a button that you could push and the thing would lift up and the tape would roll. And I didn't know what I was asking for, but I knew what I wanted to get. [INT: Sure.] Well, all these innocent moves really began the entire art of electronic editing. And by the time we got to--you know, when I was doing MACGYVER and they were editing by hand and doing-- [mimes cutting] I said, "Let's go to electronic." And we had Montage-- [INT: Montage. I remember.] with 28 or 29 beta cameras. [INT: Different machines. Yeah.] And now everybody does rough editing. 'Cause I used to hate editing in the film world because every time you made a cut, the poor editor had to put a clip on it and the assistant would roll down the clip, and the paste. And then you'd run it in the projection room and you'd say, "No, it's off by three frames." It was endless. But in the electronic world, you just punch a button and bup-bup-bup, there it is. [INT: Yup. There it is, indeed.] It works just great.

INT: In terms of the design, working with--again we're talking about crew--working with a Art Director or Production Manager, what's that experience for you? I mean, particularly if you're starting a show and you're gonna have a permanent set? I mean, how does these things evolve.
JR: Well, Ed Stevens was the best Art Director, for me, in the world. You give him a script and he came back with a set that worked. He knew exactly how to do it. [INT: Mmhmm.] I don't know how he did it. He was brilliant. And there it was just a touch here, a touch there, and you had it. Some designers really did not know how to design for three cameras. They would have too much depth, for example. [INT: Mmhmm.] Or something very important would be upstage. I'd always try to pull things down to the proscenium edge so the cameras could cut close-ups. Or in the case of doors, if there's an entrance, I'd say, "Try to make the entrance in a way that you can get a camera outside and inside so that if people open the door, you can have a colloquy on both ends." Sometimes, these designers would put an entry up there-- [INT: Upstage?] Upstage. And you'd say, "How do you get the camera up there?" You're on their back. You can't get there. And they didn't understand, coming from film. So that was the big trick. Well, on film, all holds are barred. No hold. [INT: Yeah, right.] You know what I mean? ‘Cause you can--you had four walled sets, you could turn around, do anything. But in the world of television, you better be open with the presidium situation.

INT: Now would you like models? I mean, in terms of-- [JR: No.] How would you work with the designer?
JR: Show me the sketch. [INT: Got it.] And I didn't care how perfect the sketch was. It was just a rough outlines. Just show me where the doors and windows are. And don't worry about the furniture. [INT: No?] And in fact, it's one of the tricks I had--if you call it a trick, I don't know. Remember I used to say that I'd let the Actors find their own moves. If I had a thing in mind about where I wanted an Actor, I'd put a couch where I wanted it. Or a chair. And I wouldn't say, "Go here or go there." But the Actor would find it because it was a logical place to sit. [INT: Right.] I was designing a room as if it were my living room. One of the things you always like to do is have pass-throughs between--like on the DICK VAN DYKE SHOW--I had that, that opening. In fact, I had the same thing on ALL IN THE FAMILY. There was a way to shoot from one room into another-- [INT: Right.] without cutting. And you kept the percipient flow. A lot of designers would give you a set where the poor Director has to figure out, "Okay, they're going out left to right, you've gotta cut, start over, bring them in left to right from another entrance." You don't need that. If you design it properly, you get a flow going. You don't have to stop. [INT: Got it.] I used to like that very much. Just keep going.

INT: In your film experience with Production Designers, what was that about?
JR: Well, it was just a little more careful again. I mean, I remember in the Hal Wallis [born Harold Brent Wallis] world, he had a staff of Art Directors and they were very good. But I remember one of the films I had--the first film I ever did for Hal Wallis, I remember he showed me a plan. I said, "It's very good." I said, “But...” It was a Connecticut house. I said, "How do you get to the upstairs?" He said, "What do you mean?" I said, "There's no stairway." "Oh." Just a slight overlook, but you have to learn how to read a plan, too. So I said, "No, I think you better build in a staircase so we can get up there because there are sets that are upstairs."

INT: Did you have any—now having shot both on location and on studios, is there a difference in terms of the way you work? Or a difference in even preference?
JR: I love to work on location. I think it's more exciting. Especially in--obviously in the Western field. [INT: Yeah.] And one crazy experience, one of the worst things a Director can hear in the morning is to walk by the two Assistant Directors early on a frosty morning, when you're out in the middle of no place, and hear one Assistant say to the other, "I thought he was on your bus." [Laughter] That happened to me once and I thought, "Oh my god." Now, it happens that the film I was shooting--it was a TV film, but it was a big one. And I had marked out with the location manager a particularly beautiful field of mustard. Yellow flowers. And I said, "Gee, don’t-- Mark this off. Don't let any trucks come near this place 'cause I want to get on the hill and shoot the wagon train going across this pristine valley." I said, "It's gonna make a lovely shot." "Okay, boss." So they marked it off and I got there. That was the morning I heard, "I thought he was on your bus." Well immediately, my mind goes into gear. I said, "I hope it's not the Actor in the first shot, but in case it is, I've got the following shots I can do." And so when the Assistant came trembling to me and saying, "I don't have--" I said, "Alright. It's the guy on the first shot. Let's go over here and we'll work until it gets--we'll wait--send somebody back to the studio." We're on the Simi Valley before there were freeways. [INT: Right.] And I said, "Get a phone or something." There were no phones. "Send somebody to town, call up, see if you can get this schmuck here." A late Actor is bad enough, but an Assistant Director who can't read the card is even worse. You know, "Yes sir, yes sir." So we improvised some work that was relatively close with other people. [INT: Right.] And I kept looking at the sun, waiting for the right place to mount up on the hillside to get that wagon train shot. And finally, I said, "Well in about a half hour it's gonna look good." I said to the Assistant, "Move the company up on the hill and get the wagon train down there. I'm ready to make this left to right pass." "Yes sir." So I'm up on the hill and we have the shot set up and it's gonna be lovely and the sun is coming up just exactly right. And suddenly, to my horror, something is coming straight at the camera through the field of mustard. A yellow cab. [INT: It’s with the guy.] Yeah. No matter how many yells and semaphores, nothing would stop this cab from coming. And out steps the late Actor, triumphant that he's got there on time after all. [INT: Great, great. That's perfect.] I had to make a much lesser shot, and later, I heard this Actor trying to get cab money from the Assistant and I said I got away quickly before the screaming started, you know? [INT: Right. Before you needed to hose down your--] Well no, I had nothing to do with it by that time. It was strictly the Assistant's problem, but that wrecked a very lovely shot. It really bothered me. [INT: It still does.] To this day! [INT: Yeah, I got it.] You know.

INT: Have you dealt with screen tests? What do you feel about them?
JR: Well, I don't really like them; I think there's an artificiality about them. I remember when Paramount [Paramount Pictures] was having trouble with [Dick] Martin and [Jerry] Lewis, they asked me to do a screen test with--oh, come on. The guy subsequently went on to do... [ROWAN & MARTIN'S] LAUGH-IN. [INT: Okay, yeah. [Dan] Rowan--] Rowan and Martin. Thank you. [INT: Uh-huh.] They were to be the new Martin and Lewis for Paramount. [INT: Right.] And I did a screen test of their night club act. I shot it and you know, it was like--it was not--I don't really like it because I had nothing further to do with that particular-- [INT: Right, right.] They were nice guys. Carl Reiner-- Gee, one of them, I guess it was Dick Martin and Dan Rowan--and Dan Rowan died at an early age--and I think Carl walked by Dick one day and said, "Was it you or your partner who died?" [Laughter] Geeze. And it also reminds me of, you know what you call Writers? A Writer, a team of Writers are always, what? The boys! “Get the boys to re-write the scene. Get the boys. Get the boys.” I don’t care if they were a hundred years old, they were the boys. Panama and Frank were a team of Writers. You remember those names? [INT: Yeah, I do.] And they worked at Warner Bros., I think it was, and every morning they would walk by and Jack Warner would say, "Good morning, boys." And one day, Norman Panama walked by alone and Warner said, "Good morning, boys." [Laughter] They were inseparable. They were never individuals. They were--once they were a team, they were boys. [INT: They were a team forever.] Yeah. Anyway, what was the question? [INT: Screen tests, we were talking about.] Screen tests. I did a screen test, again, I was part of the Hal Wallis unit and I screen-tested Robert Redford and Geraldine Chaplin for the role in BAREFOOT IN THE PARK. And I wanted to do the film, obviously. And I thought I would have a crack at it, but no such luck. Sidney Pollack got the job and Geraldine Chaplin did not. It was Jane Fonda-- [INT: Right.] who was, needless to say, better. But it was nice to work with Redford, whom I had seen do it in New York in the play-- [INT: Right.] as a young Actor. And that was fun, but I think Redford had a relationship with Pollack. [INT: Hmm.] And I don't mean to be suggestive about relationship. [INT: Although?] No, no, no, no. [INT: I know not that kind of relationship, but I’m talking about--but a lot of the business is about who you know.] It was a business [relationship]. Yeah. I was just trying to be funny. [INT: Yeah, I know where you were. But it's interesting issue though, about how one gets jobs and whether one gets jobs--] I wanted very much to do that film 'cause it was a great script by Neil Simon. And I thought I was in a unique position to get it because of working for the Wallis [Hal Wallis] unit. He had me do the screen test. Why shouldn't it? I didn’t. I told you about Wallis and the Elvis Presley cut, didn't I? [INT: No.] Are you sure? [INT: Well, you may have. This is your cut, his comment?] Well, both. Two things. I have a feeling I've gone through this. [INT: You may have. You may have. Because we did talk about Presley and the Wallis stuff.] It was a, it was a film called ROUSTABOUT with Elvis Presley and Barbara Stanwyck. [INT: I know the picture. Yeah, yeah.] And I did not like to shoot process and I went live on a scene where he sings a song to the leading lady on the ferris wheel. [Right, right.] Did I talk about this? [INT: Yes, you did. Yeah, it's great. It’s great.] And Wallis cut in a guy operating the machinery. [Right, I remember. Yeah, I remember.] I was furious. I said, "Why did you do this?" “Yeah, I don’t know.” I said, "You don't have to know. You saw it at the beginning. You know he's operating. I did it in one take, it saved three days of shooting, you loved it. And now you've done this.” So I put him in my will. Did I tell you that story? [INT: No. That I didn't know. Wallis was in your will?] Wallis was in my will at that time. I was like 35 years, 37 years old. And I came to him. I was furious. [INT: Of course.] Because I said, "You ruined a shot that I invented and it was great. You loved it and now you cut away." “Well…” And he owned the picture. [INT: Yeah.] He could do it. So I came in one day to his office. That was another Hal Kanter line. Hal worked in the Wallis unit too, for awhile. He came in one day. He said to the secretary, "I'd like to see Mr. Wallis." And she said, "He's in Tokyo." And Hal said, "Really? Usually he sends for it." [Laughter] Shows you the kind of Producer he was. Great line. [INT: Great line.] Oh yeah. He also, I think, is responsible for the Harry Cohn funeral. Do you remember that story? [INT: No. There’s so many great ones though. Go on.] I think it was Hal who said this because Harry Cohn was a noted despot. [INT: Right.] Everybody hated him. [INT: Yup.] And when he died, there was a huge attendance at the grave, burial service and somebody said to Hal, allegedly, "Look at the turnout for Harry Cohn's funeral." And Hal said, "Well, you give the people what they want, they'll come." [Laughter] [INT: That’s great.] So. Where was I? So I had him in my will. [INT: Right.] And I came and I said, "You know, talking about that shot that you ruined." He said, "Will you get off that?” He said,” That’s what--it's gonna stay that way." Which it did. I said, "Well, in honor of that shot, I've named you in my will. And he got a little soft look on his face. "You did?" I said, "Yes, will you like to hear what I--" And by the way, this is was literally true. And I opened up my legal document and it was a codicil to my will. I said, reading to Wallis, "If I should die before Hal Wallis, which is probable, because I'm working for the son of a bitch, I direct that my body be cremated and the ashes blown into Hal Wallis's eyes." [Laughter] And that was literally in my will. And he said, "Ah, c’mon. You didn't." I said, "Yeah, I did." Well, he was called to that great cutting room in the sky before me. [INT: Before you, right! So the ashes?] So I tore that up. And I'm sure he's re-editing something up there right now, even as we speak.

INT: Talk about issues of budget and how you dealt with them. A Director constantly has to. You know how much money you've got, you know how much money they want you to spend.
JR: Yeah. I was kind of a hero to Wallis [Hal Wallis] because I used to take outrageous shortcuts. I did my first movie--I did one nine minute take. I rehearsed Janet Leigh and Van Johnson--this is before the advent of the dreaded Shelley Winters--and they were wonderful. And he couldn't believe it. I just rehearsed it like a play and we shot it and it was a great scene. And he said, "Gee, this is good. It saved a couple of days." When I was doing a [Elvis] Presley movie, there was a sequence that called for him riding a motorcycle and singing, and it was to be done in process. Now process is a dreary, you know. The Actor sits on a bike and the screen moves behind, and you've gotta lock up and re-lock and un-lock and god help us. And it’s just-- [Holds head] And lighting and all of that. And I said, "Gee, if I could avoid this it’s wonderful." I said to Presley, "You ride a motorcycle, don't you?" He said, "Yeah." I said, "How would you like it if I recorded you singing the song while you're actually on the motorcycle. He said, "Could you do that?" I said, "I'm not sure. I think I can." So I said to the sound department, "Can I get a playback on the truck to play back to the Actor?" They said, "Well, no. Why?" They said, "Well the acetate jumps." I said, "Well why use acetate? We have tape. Tape doesn't jump.” I said, “You've got a solid platform. Can’t you play--" [Mumbles] A lot of grumbling. "We don't do that." I said, "Let's do a test." And we did a test. It works! So I said to Presley, “I tell you--” And he was delighted. [INT: Sure.] I said, "I've got a close-up camera and a long shot and it'll really show you riding your own bike. I'd just like you to be very good on lip sync because I can do this in one take." And we did, and he was perfect. And, again, Wallis went bananas. He said, "How'd you do that? Saved three days.” So in terms of budget, I was a real hero. I mean, he was a tough Producer, but he was very grateful. I mean, he gave me an inscribed watch, which I'm sure he bought on--nevermind. [Laughter] I was going to say on Fifth Avenue. No, he was actually a very generous man off the budget. [INT: Got it.] I mean, as long as you were on the film, he would get that blue pencil out like crazy. But if you were anywhere else--he once asked me, he asked me to do the film BOEING BOEING. And he said, "I'd like you to go to Europe." The play was playing in London. And I said, "Well, I’ve never been to Europe.” I said, “I don't want to fly. How about sending me on the France?" He said, "Okay." [INT: Wow.] I mean, he was that-- So I was just joking, but first class on a trans-Atlantic liner. [INT: Wow.] And he met me in London. There was another story. I met a girl on the ship and when we got to the boat train and to town, and as we got off, there's a huge commotion ahead of us. Photographers and people cutting. You know, walking against the crowd? And she said, "My god. What’s that?" I said, "I don't know. It must be somebody very important." Well, it was Hal Wallis with the entire Paramount [Paramount Pictures] publicity department, taking pictures of me. And the girl looked at me and she said, “What?” I said, "Well, I guess it's time you found out I'm an international jewel thief." [Laughter] You know? Anyway. He gave me a car. [INT: He was generous, clearly.] Very generous.

INT: Budget in terms of television stuff. What happens there?
JR: Well, with television, you know you're much more constrained and you've gotta go quickly. You know. Obviously. But there's so much waste. In fact, I made a deal with Norman Lear and Bud Yorkin. I saw so much waste in the thing. I said, "I'll tell you what." I said, "If I can save you X number of dollars from what you're spending right now," I said, "Will you share it with me?" They said, "Yeah. Great." I got 15% of what I saved. [INT: Now what kind of things were you saving? What kind of things were--] Well, I just saw all kinds of extraneous costs going around. I don't know. There are specifics. Oh, I remember one thing I did at Paramount [Paramount Pictures], which--there was a thing where, if you came onto the stage, even for a reading of a text, and I'm talking about both film and TV. If an electrician -- if you came onto the set, an electrician would have to light the set. Or light the lights. Not on the set. The set was not lit. Just enough lights. [INT: Just turn on the lights.] Work lights. And that electrician was on the clock until you left. All day long. And I said to the Paramount people, I said, "Why can't I turn on the lights in the morning if I'm having a reading?" They said, "Oh, but those are technical lights." I said, "Yeah, but those are lights that are used to light the set. Can't I put in some fluorescent lights over the table and let me--" I said, "If I came into a room and flicked a switch, I'm not doing anything specifically electrical. I could save countless number of dollars." And they said, "Gee, maybe you can." And we did. And now everybody does it, you know? Because I said, "This is so wasteful to have a company standing by-- I mean, a chief electrical yet, standing by to turn on a light and turn it off a night." It's stupid. [INT: Yup.] Well-- And the crews, he'd say, they'd get angry. No, they understood, too. They didn't like--I don't think people like featherbedding anymore than we do. Certainly in our Guild. [INT: Yup.] We're very much against that syndrome of the fireman maintaining his job on a diesel locomotive. [INT: Yup.] Don't want that. [INT: Yup, yup.]

INT: I noticed a couple things you were talking about. Moving on to the issues of sort of the shooting. You definitely do homework. That's real clear.
JR: The homework--most of the homework is done when I'm doing a live show, where I've got to cut live. [INT: Right.] Or from the booth. And there I got to be very specific about working out my camera positions so I don't get tangled in all that spaghetti. And yet I always keep enough, enough--what's the word-- padding, in a sense, so I can move quickly in another direction. And yeah, I don't do any of that when I'm making a film, I never do any camera work. It's all in my head. [INT: Mmhmm.] I mean, except for locations. I will go out to a location and know that I'm gonna shoot left to right, right to left. I start that process going; and after that, the biggest thing I'm concerned about is where the sun is for the time of day that I'm out there. Frequently, if you go out on a reconnaissance and you say, "This looks wonderful." But you better know you're gonna be there at that same time of day. [INT: Yup, yeah.] So that's an important consideration.

INT: Do you, in terms of the homework that you might do--in terms of--particularly in those first three days of rehearsal-- The kind of--what notes are you making for yourself on the script that you either may or may not be communicating, if at all? Or even in your head?
JR: Towards the third day, I start to just jot down a rough notation, again, if it's the electronic form of shooting, I'll put down, "This might be camera three; this might be a four; this might be camera whatever." But not nailed. [INT: But now that's in terms of your relationship with the image that you’re going to record.] Yeah. [INT: What about a relationship to the performers themselves? Meaning--and I realize they know who their characters are after awhile so there isn't as much work to be done--but are you making notes too, that you may or may not -- either mental notes or written notes?] Oh I give them notes after every run--we will run something, we'll sit and talk about it. After every single run and we have many, many runs. Yeah. I don't like to interrupt unless it's really egregious. [INT: Mmhmm.] If they're off the beat completely, I’ll say, “Hold it. You’re really going down a wrong path.” But usually, I'll let them go through a complete run of the scene at least and then I’ll say, “Lets talk about it. Here's what I saw." And sometimes I'll see an Actor make a move that's kind of an unconscious flick. And I will say later, "What were you thinking about when you did that?" "Oh, you caught that?" And I'll say, "Yeah, you were thinking something. Did you have a desire to move in that direction?" They'd say, "Yeah. How'd you know?" I'd say, "Well, I'm just looking at your body language. Why not try that? It looks like that might be something that--" So we'd try it. [INT: Right.] Or I would say to somebody, "That was a good one." You know, they'd catch something and I'd say, "Great.” You know? “Make sure you keep that. Save that. Don't throw that away." [INT: Hmm.] But for making massive notes: No. [INT: Oh.] And on a film show, I mean on a feature, I have to stay loose because I don't know what the elements are gonna tell me. And that makes a whole big difference.

INT: You said something earlier about sometimes the scripts would be like 50% there. What would make you recognize that the script is there? What is it that you see or experience in your mind that says, "Okay."
JR: Well, it's like--Carl Reiner used to say something very interesting. He said when they were doing [YOUR] SHOW OF SHOWS, they would say, if there was one sketch that really appealed to them, then the shows we're doing that week. And that's interesting. Now, that's kind of the way I would look at a 50%. I'd have to have a scene or two that really appealed to me. I said, "I like this." Even though there must be something weak around it, I'd say, "We can fix that. [INT: Right.] But let's make sure there's enough spine that we could go to work on it." And that's my 50%. The rest of it, I'm not worried about. But If I pick up a frequently that's completely dud and say, "I can't do this." And not only I can't do this, but we shouldn't do this. There are some scripts that just go over the line. It's like when I was producing ALL IN THE FAMILY, a Writer came to me and he was pitching an idea. He said, "A swastika is painted on the Bunker front door." I said, "Wow. Where does that go?" Then he spun a story about it turned out to be Indians. The Indians who work on skyscrapers in New York, ‘cause the swastika, as you know, is a derivative of some Indian signs. And I said, "I don't think so." I said, "I'll tell you what. The swastika intrigues me." And I said, "Our set happens to be up. Let's walk down to the stage. If the door opens inward," I said, "I'll buy the swastika beginning. We'll go it a different way." So we walked down and the door did open that way. So we wrote the script and the day we did it, I had the sign painter do a particularly nasty, evil, black. dripping paint swastika.